If your kids or wife are sleeping in the next room you can play your electric guitar with little or no noise.

I suggest that you choose a portable headphone amplifier instead of a standard amp. Standard amps have mains hum which I can assure you gets irritating, especially when listening through headphones.

A portable battery powered amp doesn't suffer from this problem. It also has the advantage of being easy to carry around. You can find models that also provide rhythm backing, built-in metronomes or a line-in to play-along with your favourite CDs. They much a much more useful practice tool.

2. Easier to play

Electric guitars generally have slimmer necks and lighter strings than acoustic guitars. This makes them easier to play for a beginner.

3. No bridge pins

My pet hate is the bridge pins on my acoustic guitar. Changing strings is always a traumatic experience for me with these. I know that acoustic guitar models without bridge pins exist, but I couldn't find one that matched with all the other things I was looking for.

Electric guitars don't have bridge pins, so changing the strings is much simpler.

4. Solid body is more solid

An electric guitar's solid body stands up to the assaults of your 4 year old and his friends ;-) You'll have to watch out for that neck, though...

5. Wider choice of colours

You'll have more choice of colour for electric guitars than for acoustics :-) Most acoustic guitars offer the choice of a plain old wood finish. There are a few coloured models out there, but apart from black the choice is somewhat limited.

This might not seem very serious, but colour is really important to some. And as I already said, your guitar has got to feel good to you.

So What Will You Choose?

That wraps up my acoustic vs. electrics series. I hope it helps you to make your choice, but remember the decision is yours. I wish you fun whatever guitar you choose.